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Without even knowing it, you could be sabotaging your home sale. Here are the five ways that you might actually be driving buyers away from your home, leaving it to languish on the market for longer:
- Bad color schemes. You may view the wacky color schemes in your home as a point of pride, but buyers aren’t likely to find it pleasing to the eye. It’s best to stay away from dark colors—you may call it “plum,” but buyers see dark purple nonetheless. Steer clear from the opposite extreme as well: Loud, bright colors will have the same effect. Neutral, muted color schemes are sure to appeal to the largest number of buyers.
- Too much personal taste. Your undying love for a sports team is a great thing, but having it on full display for buyers? Not so much. In fact, in some cases, we’ve had buyers who’ve walked away from a showing offended by the very sight of decor featuring a rival team. In another instance of inordinate personal taste, the seller had a hairless cat that they left in the home while showings were going on. Our buyer was not very fond of this, and it diverted attention away from the home itself.
- Bad odors. No buyer is going to get excited about a home that smells funky, so this is a surefire way to sabotage a sale. Two particular odors to watch out for are smoke and pets. By now, you’ve probably grown so familiar with them that you don’t notice, but buyers will. The CDC has stated that the presence of smoke in a home can linger for years after the smoker has left. You may have to take some costly, extreme measures like shampooing the drapes and carpet and repainting the walls just to get the smell under control. As for pet odors, if it can pass the “smell test,” some less intensive cleaning may suffice.
- Inflexibility with showings. It’s a given that you’ll experience some inconvenience when it comes to showing your home, but the more convenient you make it for buyers, the greater the chances you’ll land a buyer and sell for top dollar. One thing we do to make it easier for sellers is to host a “Grand Open House.” Through this approach, we’ll market the first open house as an event and try to get buyers to come out en masse in the hopes that it will produce a few offers right from the outset. In the event that no offers come of it, though, flexibility is a must.
“No buyer is going to get excited about a home that smells funky, so this is a surefire way to sabotage a sale.”
- Disguising problems. Honesty is the name of the game when selling your home. Per Hawaii’s laws, you’re required to disclose any information that could affect the value of your home. Always be sure to make any pertinent information known on the seller’s disclosure and have a home inspection done. By making superficial fixes to or ignoring larger problems, you’re vulnerable to legal liability, so take care of these problems areas.
If you have any further questions about today’s topic or anything else related to real estate, please contact us. We’d love to help. Aloha!